NISSAN ENDS PHL TOURISM PROGRAM
Ending the ‘discovery’ with a smile
IT HAS BEEN A YEAR filled with discoveries for Nissan Philippines, Inc. (NPI) and guests that tagged along for the car maker’s “Drive to Discover,” or D2D, tour program held in partnership with the Tourism Promotion Board of the Department of Tourism (Dot).
To end the 2016 program on a happy note, NPI set its sights on Bacolod City in Negros Province to witness one of the country’s most colorful celebrations, the Masskara Festival.
Fittingly, NPI would come in via its most uniquely designed compact crossover, the Nissan Juke, and in the cheery Solar Yellow and Red Alert colors, at that.
The recent event’s itinerary was packed, but not all the activities were centered on the festival itself. The local tourism office made sure that the party extended offshore. Right on the first day of the tour, the group — composed of NPI officers, staff and some motoring journalists — boarded their respective Jukes and headed north towards the Cadiz coast in northern Negros Occidental. From there, a 30-minute boat ride took the group to the 13-hectare banana-shaped island of Lakawon, an up-and-coming resort highlighted by white sand beach all around, and a floating bar and restaurant.
And that was just for starters. The next morning was devoted to a heritage tour of the province, so the group drove to Silay City to visit Balay Negrense, a 118-year-old ancestral house of the sugar baron Victor F. Gaston. Notable for being the first museum established (in 1990) in Negros Occidental, Balay Negrense’s 12 rooms depict in stunning detail the culture, fashion and socioeconomic norms of late 19th and early 20th century Negros. Incidentally, the museum guide also told the group that of the 31 ancestral houses still standing in Silay, 29 have been restored or maintained in good condition.
That afternoon, the group headed toward the verdant highlands of the municipality of Don Salvador Benedicto to visit the Rapha Valley and partake of organic, vegetarian meals and sweet treats. It was also here, at elevations exceeding 600 meters, that the group enjoyed the Juke, which made short work of the twisty roads leading to and from Rapha Valley, its 1.6-liter DOHC, CVTC, 16- valve, four- cylinder gasoline engine and award-winning Xtronic CVT transmission managing the curves quite well. Its colors and “Robiotic” design certainly stood out from the lush flora of the mountains.
The highlight of this tour was the “electric Masskara” on the streets of Bacolod City that night, which kicked off the weekend celebrations of the Festival. The group was strategically positioned to get up close with all the Masskara floats that would pass by.
To sum that night up in one word: Dazzling. Dozens of creatively set up floats, carrying ornately costumed and masked dancers wearing flashing body lights and LED glow accessories, attempted to outshine each other. And loud dance music, throbbing festival beats, enticed everyone — masked or otherwise — to move and groove.
The Masskara Festival’s frenzied, uber-joyful theme serves a solemn purpose. The festival was borne of a tragedy that befell the sugar capital of the Philippines in 1980. That year, amidst global sugar prices falling at an alltime low, the inter-island vessel MV Don Juan collided with the tanker Tacloban City on April 22. An estimated 700 lives were lost that day, many of them from Bacolod City.
The city’s artists, local government and civic groups decided to hold a “Festival of Smiles,” as the city was also known as the City of Smiles, hoping to pull its residents out of the gloom and depression. The “Festival of Smiles” eventually became known as the Masskara Festival, pertaining to the mask motif showing that no matter how tough and bad the times were, Bacolod City would pull through, survive and, in the end, triumph.
Thirty- six years later, the Masskara Festival has become a global spectacle. Bacolod City Mayor Evelio R. Leonardia has disclosed that the festival has been recognized by cable news organization CNN as one of the “12 best things in the Philippines.” He added that National Geographic has also declared that the Masskara Festival as among the world’s 10 “must go to” festivals.
Such a spectacle moved Ramesh Narasimhan, president and managing director of NPI, on his first D2D tour to utter; “What an amazing day I’ve had. This has been a lot of fun. What a way to finish the 2016 D2D program in the ‘City of Smiles’. I certainly look forward to the 2017 program.”
Mr. Leonardia welcomed the prospect of NPI’s return for the 2017 Masskara Festival. “Perhaps, in the future, we might be able to infuse the Nissan brand into the Masskara Festival,” he quipped.
The jolly-looking Juke would certainly need no mask for that occasion.